The construction of spherical domes has a long history. There are many types of spherical domes constructed of materials such as reinforced concrete, foam, structural steel, and even ice. Reinforced concrete and foam type domes typically require the use of forms. Structural steel domes typically require many members and connections. Of course, ice is typically used in the construction of igloos, a special case of domes.
It is desirable to provide economical and simple construction for domes, especially larger domes. Costly and complex designs and construction have often been used, however there are many cases where simplicity and economy are desired and needed.
Aesthetics, of course, is usually an important factor, but do not necessarily require costly, complex designs and construction. There are many aesthetic dome designs. Many of them have strived for simplicity and economy, parameters which are difficult to achieve.
Domes date back thousands of years. There have been Roman, Persian, Arabic, Western-European, Italian Renaissance, Ottoman, Russian, Indian, and Islamic domes.
There are many types of domes, including corbel domes, onion domes, oval domes, parabolic domes, polygonal domes, sail domes, saucer domes, and umbrella domes.
In more recent times, noted domes are the Saint Paul's Cathedral dome, the United States Capitol building dome, the Astrodome, and the SkyDome. There are many other influential and famous domes, too numerous to mention.
In the present time, there have been many domes constructed based upon the concepts of Richard Buckminster Fuller's U.S. Pat. No. 2,682,235, “Building Construction”, Jun. 29, 1954. Another patent by Richard Buckminster Fuller, U.S. Pat. No. 3,197,927, “Geodesic Structures”, Aug. 3, 1965, utilizes the concepts of his “Building Construction” patent. Other patents have been found which attempt to address the complexities of domes. One is a patent by Melvin Crooks, U.S. Pat. No. 4,182,086, “Building Construction of A-Shaped Elements”, Jan. 8, 1980. It is a worldwide desire to simplify domes, as evidenced by an inventor from Japan, Toshiro Suzuki, U.S. Pat. No. 5,069,009, “Shell Structure and Method of Constructing”, Dec. 3, 1991.
Despite the striving for simplicity and economy, combined with aesthetics, domes continue to be quite complex and costly. Almost all domes, especially the larger ones, remain difficult to build, some of them requiring shoring, such as the case for concrete domes, and some of them require many different parts and connections, such as the case for structural steel domes. Even geodesic domes have many and complex parts and connections. Complexity with resultant high costs seem to be inherent in such structures.
The “Spherical Dome”, as hereafter described, solves the problem of complexity, providing a simple, aesthetic, and economical solution.